What is Hillbilly Heroin?

Hillbilly heroin is a slang term used to refer to oxycodone, a synthetic opioid used as an analgesic. Oxycodone abuse began to be documented in rural regions of the United States in 1990s, explaining the origins of the slang term. A “hillbilly” is someone who lives in a rural area, and oxycodone is a narcotic that is chemically related to heroin.

People abuse oxycodone, often in the form of the time-release formulation OxyContin®, because it delivers a high similar to the one experienced on heroin. Since it is a legal drug, hillbilly heroin can be easier to obtain than heroin. Patients get the drug through doctor shopping, which means they go to multiple doctors seeking analgesic medications, as well as from dealers, who sometimes include unscrupulous doctors. Using prescription drugs can be safer than street drugs, such as heroin, as it is easier to tell when drugs are adulterated or counterfeited, allowing people to avoid drugs with unsafe additives.

The opioid characteristics are what makes oxycodone so effective for pain management; in fact, heroin itself was once used for analgesia in medical settings. Thus, pharmaceutical companies cannot change the formulation of the drug to reduce abuse. Cracking down on how the drug is dispensed can help address abuse, but it also makes it more difficult for patients who legitimately need the drug to obtain it. People such as cancer patients and individuals with chronic pain conditions can develop tolerances that require high levels of the drug, setting off alarms at pharmacies required to report high utilization of oxycodone and certain other drugs.

Although people refer to oxycodone addiction with terms like “hillbilly heroin,” addiction to this drug is a problem in urban areas as well. Some very high profile individuals, including celebrities, have found themselves in legal or medical trouble as a result of using hillbilly heroin. The problem with the drug is that as people take it, they build up a tolerance and thus require higher doses in order to obtain a high. Soon, people can skirt a dangerous line between finding a high and depressing their central nervous systems so much that they stop breathing.

Drug diversion, in which pharmaceuticals end up being used recreationally, is a serious problem in many nations. Government task forces have been formed to address issues such as abuse of hillbilly heroin and other prescription drugs. Narcotics, in particular, tend to be popular targets for drug abusers in addition to being an important treatment tool for patients. Programs aimed at identifying and stopping drug diversion must weigh the legitimate needs of patients against abusive use, and sometimes it is difficult to distinguish between the two.